Smart home technology for the masses?

May 8, 2012

Smart home technology advanced a step further this past week with Microsoft’s HomeOS. Basically, its an operating system that allows users to manage their home networks by providing a central hub whereby various home devices can be controlled. With many homes already containing PC’s, game consoles, wireless devices, tablets, cameras, smart phones, various appliances, etc, it would seem only natural that there be an easy method to commuincate with these devices and to have the ability to centrally control them as well.  Microsoft is attempting to bring this to reality.
Although still a prototype, Microsoft is hoping,

“To simplify the management of technology and to simplify the development of applications in the home.”

However, in addition to Microsoft’s answer to smart home tech, Google has also thrown its hat into the ring as well. Both tech giants hope to use apps wherein users can control devices via their smart phones/tablets.

Leave a Comment » | Mobile Apps, Networking, OS, Smart home, Wi-Fi | Permalink
Posted by UrbanTechGuy

A Matrix Net?

April 18, 2012

“A startup called Nicira is reinventing computer networking with an audacious goal: to make all kinds of Internet services smarter, faster, and cheaper.”

Confronted with the task to solve a problem a U.S. intelligence agency needed to solve, Martin Casado attempted a solution but the result didn’t meet the agency’s security requirements.
Fast forward a few years and Casado, a PhD candidate at Stanford University, “proposed a radical new way for computer networks to operate.”
Due to the infrastructure of the internet, Casado was previously unable to provide a solution.
However, the essence of his current solution and the core of his PhD thesis is that by writing software he could reprogram routers and switches to provide a set of connections to securely route data through.

Eventually, Casado founded Nicira.  Essentially, this software creates a virtual network that’s indistinguishable from a physical one.  And it gives clound administrators Matrix-like powers.

Leave a Comment » | Cloud computing, Networking, Virtualization | Permalink
Posted by UrbanTechGuy